At the Grave of Life
by Hitokiri Gentatsu
Summary: Kenshin's thoughts as he stands at Tomoe's grave in episode 62 of the series


At the Grave of Life  
  
By: Hitokiri Gentatsu  
  
Disclaimer: Kenshin's thought while at Tomoe's grave in episode 62. This is a revised version for what I first put up. Enjoy.  
  
"Kyoto reminds me of the one who rests here..."  
Himura Kenshin  
RK Episode 62  
  
Ten years have passed since I last came here, yet nothing about this place has changed with the passage of those years. The markers stand in their quiet rows and there is an aura of deep silence about the place, as if the hand of time was simply suspended here while continuing to pass beyond these walls. I walk through the markers knowing exactly where I am going even though I have not been here since the day I bid you farewell for the final time.  
  
I find the place where you rest easily, for it is the only swath of green in a sea of grayish stone. It is living while everything else around it is dead, symbolizing the life you gave so that I could live. I smile sadly, thinking of the brief time we shared and still feel a pain in my heart from your loss, which came at my own hand. I pull the bandage that covers my scar off in a swift motion no longer wanting to hide it from anyone. There is no one for me to fear and only memories remain. I kneel down in front of your marker within its rectangle of green, which is only green because I ordered it to be so using the power of that name, which I have long ago laid aside in this time of peace. I lay the flowers I have finally been able to bring for you. I bend my head in prayerful meditation, ignoring the wind that blows through my hair and the rain that is soaking my clothing darkening both my hair and the cloth of my clothing to more somber colors.  
  
I have come here to make peace with my past and to try to let go of things from that past that still weigh heavily on my heart, which prevent me from truly living. I have had a close brush with death, closer than any one before and realize that I need to let go of some of things of the past that I still cling to, like a man drowning might cling to his gold at the cost of his life. The past still is there within my heart whatever I may say or think otherwise. I dwell on it and it haunts my every thought and dream. Not a day passes that I don't think of what has passed here or what happened between us. There has not been a day when I have not had to fight off the despair that dwells inside or the hitokiri's rage that still resides within my soul. When I wake, when I prepare for sleep there is not a time that a part of me does not dwell on these things and on you.  
  
You were the one who gave me back my life and then protected that same life with your own for the promise of a dream. All for the hope that I could live a new life in peace and happiness after the war drums and the blood storm were over. You taught me that there was another person hidden within the shadowed soul of the hitokiri I had become and who had surrounded himself with death. That person was one who respected all life and held it sacred. He was one who never sought to harm anyone and who lived in the hope that peace would finally come out of war. You were the only one who could have shown me these things for I could not see them myself. I was too lost to my darker self and my true self had become overshadowed by the spirit of the killer I had become and with a year of killing. I knew I was not happy but could not find out the reason behind that feeling. You saw what I, trapped in the rage of the killer I had become, could not see and you showed me a new life. You are responsible for so much in my life and for the man that I have become. Without your timely intervention I would have been lost in the chaos of the Bakumatsu or lost to the raging madness of the hitokiri, losing my soul to that darkness of spirit that came over me when he was in control of my actions.  
  
You showed me the way and now I have shown others the same, returning their lives to the path they were meant to follow and turning them from the path of chaos as you once did for me. Your memory guides my actions, as it always has, and your words are engraved on my heart, even though you never spoke to me of the thoughts you carried inside. The path of redemption I chose was the same as your own and I live every day hoping that my own soul might be redeemed, that my crimes might be pardoned as yours were. I may never know if the souls of those I killed forgive me for my actions and I would not expect them to but if the families they left behind have forgiveness in their hearts then that is good enough for me even if I never know of that forgivness. Your memory will continue to guide me in my new life and your love will be a light in the darkness of my soul, a light that will burn brightly within it so that I will never fall back into darkness again.   
  
I will always carry your memory engraved on my heart but the time has come for me to move on now. Bitter tears slide down my face to mingle with the rain there but I do not let them stop. Your love is still an important part of my life and so to is you memory for without either I would never have made it this far. Without you my heart would not have changed but you are of my past now and I must look to the present for that is where I live now. I must look to my friends who have become my life in the here and now and to the girl that gives me hope for future happiness as you once did. I want to ask your blessing on this new life and your forgiveness for things past if you can find it in your heart to do so.   
  
Forgive me for not visiting you sooner but, in my selfishness, I allowed myself to believe it would be better if I stayed away from this city and this place. I was too afraid that someone would remember who I was and would want a fight. I was afraid of the past, which this city represents and I was worried what memories such a visit would stir within my heart. I didn't want to come here because the very act of doing so would make the pain harder to bare and would confirm what I knew in my heart to be true. But now I have no need for these fears. No one here cares about the past anymore or about who I was then. Times change just as the seasons and it is time that I begin to change as well. I must go now and I promise to return here every year to remember but not to dwell on the past.   
  
Farewell to the one how gave me a second chance and who restored my soul. Until next year, my first love. 


End file.
